Any stock who doesn’t make money tomorrow is being fed to my dogs. There is no reason (outside of pathetic earnings) a company should be down verse their Friday close come Tuesday afternoon—nein! Such underperformance firmly places said stocks in camp loser where they can enjoy bouncing around and listening to drum circles for all I care.

It is your job, low float micro crapper, to outperform the bastard indices, by a factor of 10. Is that so much for a reasonable speculator to ask?

Also, please, may we have another analyst initiate bullish coverage of Ari-BABA? I think one more might put a bid in this demented China-laggard.

The longer we sit up here, the more buyers are going to gain confidence to trade up to 4414.25 (Thursday gap fill).

For westerners, the week hasn’t even started. But news from the orient already has participants buzzing. Several sources are reporting the Chinese have cut their reserve ratio. These actions prove they give zero shits about the rapid advance of their stocked market because the growth isn’t fast enough.

It’s difficult to say what the ramifications of these actions will be. However, I laid the groundwork in this week’s strategy session that will allow me to filter out the noise and focus on a few distinct puzzle pieces as a tell.

Moreover, these actions tell a story about what needs to be done in the United States. We need more QE. Our economic superiority depends on it. At the least, this action should give participants in the ‘liftoff’ camp a major reason to reconsider timeline.

Welcome to the two way market, it’s pretty great if you respect some form of mean revision.

Everyone sleeps on your boy Raul. Perhaps I am not clear enough at times. Maybe it’s these esoteric charts and words putting readers asleep. Maybe the fragmented nature of my existence is confusing for the slow internet types. You would prefer it all be more clear, totally fair.

Aside—thank you Weekly Strategy Session subs. You may not know it, but your contributions fuel insightful research into how the markets tick. I’m grateful for your pittance, for it raised the stakes on my data-keeping skills.

In return you guys, all of you guys (even the public school kids), will know when the data senses a raid on the horizon.

To be honest, you were better served reading the blog than the Strategy Session this week, because I did not fully embrace what the data was saying until after Monday’s giving up the open drive (which “should not” happen).

There’s a lot of day left and no sign of buyers yet. I have no idea what next week will bring, but come Sunday I will so throw a few bucks in the vending machine and grab the latest edition of Weekly Strategy Session.

Go ahead and take comfort in the gentle markets. This is unbelievable. Conditions look good and stocks are behaving well.

Today the Nasdaq did almost everything a well functioning market would do. Primarily it gave the nearest volume pocket a thorough discourse consisting of assessing the quality of the terrain and deeming it fair footing for buyers to sellers to orderly come together and facilitate trade amongst one another. Anyone who made a transaction today was welcomed to tea sandwiches and soda water on their way out.

Bears and bulls discussed the current events over cigars afterwards and the nearby steakhouse was made busy with folks dressed in business professional attire.

Fine. But that doesn’t create the lower prices I need to ease back in, so here I sit and brood.

Only one short year ago, at this same tax deadline juncture, markets were in ultra extreme turmoil [sic]. Hundreds of thousands of puts were being accumulated each day, VIX was elevated, and more stocks were hitting 52 week lows then highs. It had a different feel. It felt like a sweet opportunity to go long.

This year everyone is cavorting about town with rose colored sunglasses on. They admire the neighbor’s wife while stuffing their faces full of barbecued meats. The collective life of man is in a state of gluttonous bliss, drunk on the spoils of speculation.

Despite my bearish demeanor and willingness to pen it upon the finest internet quarters the world has to offer, I have no intention of proselytizing the bulls. Bulls have done well. The wind is on their buns. Also to clarify, I am mostly long. However, I am not as long as I was on Monday, and I want to be, slowly, from lower.

Hopefully you were able to book a few gains into this afternoon’s strength because come Friday the market intends to ram a fist through your toothy grin. People are way ahead of themselves, like summer is already here.

You may think it is safe to plant annuals, but frost is coming—a frost so thick it will crumble traps and wilt your impatient plantings. Wearing shorts and other revealing clothing will result in frostbitten knees and midriffs.

Today means nothing in the grand scheme of things, an unseasonably warm day. The Nasdaq rallied, the ubiquitous Netflix is blazing higher, Intel pleased investors, Goldman Sachs is being front ran, and energy is making delicious and powerful moves up.

Odds are still elevated for lower prices come Friday’s close. There have been little clues bears are waffling an opportunity here. Their last hope for swift death are the lagging transports. They (I) will point to this chart and pray to Darth Vader if breaks lower.

Watch it closely enough, and you won’t see all the stocks posting double digit gains.

I’m off to devastate dumbbells for being pathetic and light.

Please, by all means, pull up a chair. We have to discuss the situation we’re in.

Despite a valiant attempt to mend the charts bulls are stumbling about the china shop. Their hooves are slipping every which way on millions of marbles strewn across the floor by clown suited algorithms. Don’t laugh bears, they intend to exact the same hilarious gag on you.

The markets are no longer permitted to look good for bulls or bears. Much like the internet, they are designed to squeeze profit margins down to extinction. They are destined to test every drop of fortitude you’ve got.

It is your job, your only job, to become exceedingly selective with your trades. I have reduced the number of day trade types I will pursue down to 2 from about 9. Only the milk mates—the crème is off limits.

As for swing trades, duration is no less than 3 months and it would be a cold day in hell when you’d find me buying something without the institutional support of Exodus. Oh indeed, you may have noticed 3 months means earnings will be held through…you’re god damned right. Therefore the names I choose must pass a moderate litmus test of fundamental growth and valuation.

All my data is fine and dandy and pointing to lower by Friday, but ultimately our fate is in the hands of WFC, JPM, BAC, and C. I suppose GOOGL and INTC too.

Now some might take this news harshly, and perhaps even lose their cool. When I look at how we traded today, paired with some data I’ve been keeping, this has the makings of a down week.

And that makes sense to me because things were starting to look too good.

Whenever conditions percolate into a lovely pot of honey, the counterparty comes in and bats said honey onto the floor for all the ants (algos) to slurp up.

It’s not even honey for the bears, if we go down this week. They’re stopped out. The honey goes to the worker robots who feed their queen.

Early this morning I cut out of XLE. I sat with the position for many weeks, and still feel constructive on the ETF, but it tagged its VPOC and turned decidedly lower. I feel better prices may be offered up.

This was a huge position and thus my cash is back up after being all in for the last 10-12 days.

Perhaps my data is misleading me, but a red week would not surprise me whatsoever.

Feast and famine has been a consistent theme since branching away from corporate mediocrity. Instead of slow financial ascent and rapid soul deterioration life is a big wave competition with jagged crests and deep troughs. Such a ride demands mental and spiritual focus, and sharpening. I’m grateful.

It took about a year to embrace the power of focused intensity sessions followed by active recovery. Yet, at my roots, this is my nature. I was always a sprinter who demanded every muscle fiber give every drop of energy for a specific performance. Then it was back to chilling and watching the distance runners.

This weekend was thick cut rib eyes. Now I have to listen to my body tick because all that red meat likely made me aggressive. Isn’t there a big golf match on? That might be just what the doctor ordered.

Weekly Strategy Session subs, the latest report is out. It covers some interesting contextual notes and one potentially harmful undercurrent. Check it out and let me know what you think.

Want to start the week with a solid grasp of what’s driving the stock market? Then check out this week’s report by clicking here.

There is something special about micro breaks, micro anything really—just enough of something to make an impact. All too often the greed comes out, you know, and once you have a taste of something good you go hard like a glut. This is a problem, dude.

Today had the early hallmarks of a sell type day, but buyers refuted the action, early, and have been leaning on the levee ever since. It’s a special sort of day, one where I rekindled a relationship with an old friend and also a general day of gregarious winship.

One must of course remember these fine days and savor them like a nugget of chocolate. There’s little for me to do (my bed is made and just right) and I feel no urge to work for the sake of occupying myself. The winds outside are blowing a consistent 30MPH and enterprise is calling my name.

Top picks into tax weekend: DE, CHGG, SUNE, and the magnificent Elon